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| Photo by Carol Pyles, |
For me, it's "couponing." Or at least, it used to be.
Have you ever watched "Extreme Couponing?" I watched a couple of episodes and just ended up feeling baffled. Because I used to coupon pretty religiously, and I never saved the kind of money they save on that show.
Here's my current thinking on couponing. I don't think you can do extreme couponing and still claim that you're "living rich." The reason why is because the kind of couponing that you need to do to save 90%, 75% or even 50% robs you of time you could be spending doing truly "rich" things. And by "rich" I mean time with your family and time spent doing things you actually love, like hobbies and other activities.
When I couponed religiously, I would have to carve time out every Sunday to go pick up the Sunday paper, where all the coupons were. And then I'd spend a few hours clipping them and filing them away. But here's the other problem--you also have to plan meals around whatever is on sale that week, and that's not only time consuming, it also limits the types of things that you can cook. So you may end up eating stuff you don't enjoy, or worse, serving stuff your kids refuse to eat and then you're throwing it all in the trash anyway. You may also be doing without things you otherwise need, because you're unwilling to pay full price for anything.
Don't get me wrong, I coupon, to a certain degree. I signed up for Safeway's "Just for U" and I do it all online, but I only spend a few minutes each week checking off items that a) I know will keep long enough to be worth buying in bulk or b) I know I'll use in the week that I buy them or c) either fit with a meal plan I've already established, or will be easy to incorporate into an alternative meal plan.
So yes, I do plan meals loosely around what I have in stock and what is on sale, and I stock up on items when they're cheap. At the end of it all I generally save between 30 and 35 percent on each trip to Safeway. I also shop at the Grocery Outlet and at Sam's Club for additional savings. And the result of all that work is that I'm only spending about $1.82 per person, per meal--and I'm lumping non food expenses into that number, too (like paper towels, toothpaste etc.) Could I do better than that? Almost definitely. But I don't want to devote so much of my time to saving money at the grocery store that I miss out on the other things that are meaningful to me.
So couponing, well, if clipping coupons is something you like to do and the thrill of saving money ranks right up there with the thrill of jumping out of an airplane or tracking down that rare coin from an obscure nation in the former Soviet Union, you should totally do it. If it's a chore, really, it's not worth it. There are plenty of less time-consuming ways to save, and besides, pigeon-holing yourself into only buying those deeply-discounted items is just way too limiting.
